NASA's Mars orbiter has found that water flows on the Red Planet longer than thought

NASA’s Mars orbiter has found that water flows on the Red Planet longer than thought. 

Washington: Most people believe that the water on Mars evaporated around 3 billion years ago.

However, two researchers looking at the data of NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter found evidence for liquid water in Mars Red Planet as recently as 2 billion to 2.5 billion years ago. 

That means the water was flowing there 1 billion years later than the previous estimates.

The results, presented in AGU Advances, center on the chloride salt deposits that were left behind after the meltwater of icy temperatures moving over the entire landscape evaporated.

The shape of some valley networks suggested that water might have been flowing on Mars in the past. The salt deposits are the first evidence from minerals proving their existence in liquid water.

The findings raise new questions regarding how long living things could have lasted on Mars if it was ever formed. But, at the very least, when there is water, there’s life on Earth.

Ellen Leask, a post-doctoral researcher at Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory, along with professor Bethany Ehlmann from California Institute of Technology (Caltech), utilized results from the MRO instrument. 

It is dubbed the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Sensor (CRISM) Mars (CRISM) to identify the chloride salts throughout those clay-rich highlands in MarsSouthern hemisphere the terrain that was pockmarked by the impact craters.

These craters are one of the keys to dating salts. The less than a place has craters more, the younger it’s. 

So when you count the number of craters on the surface, scientists can determine the age of the terrain.

MRO comes with two camera models that work ideal for this job. Its wide-angle lens in black and white aids scientists in determining the size of chlorides.

To increase the resolution, scientists use the high-resolution imaging science experiment (HiRISE) color camera, which allows them to view details as small as those of a Mars space rover.

By using both cameras to produce Digital elevation maps, Leask and Ehlmann found that most salts were found in depressions that were once the home of shallow ponds gentle slopes of volcanic plains.

The researchers also discovered dry, winding channels close by the streams that supply surface runoff (from the periodic melting of permafrost, ice, or snow) to these lakes.

Crater counts and evidence of the presence of salts in the top of the volcanic terrain helped scientists establish the dates for the deposits.

“What is amazing is that after more than a decade of providing the high-resolution image, stereo, and infrared data, MRO has driven discoveries about the nature and timing of these river-connected ancient salt ponds,” said Ehlmann CRISM’s deputy principal investigator.

They were discovered by NASA’s Mars Odyssey orbiter, which was launched in 2001.

MRO It has more complex instruments than Odyssey it was first started operations in 2005, it has also been studying salts, as well as other aspects of Mars since then.